Hsin Tan Rapid on the Yangtze River
The rapids on the river give rise to a considerable amount of occupation for men called Trackers, whose occupation is the dragging of boats up-stream through the wild and dangerous waters of the rapids. These men live in huts on the river banks as close to the water’s edge as possible. A group of their huts is to be seen on the left of the picture, and on the extreme left, almost too small to be visible, are four hundred trackers dragging up a boat. At the top and foot of every rapid on the Yangtze are to be found one or more Red Lifeboats, which are most efficiently and admirably manned and maintained at the cost of Benevolent Guilds—one of the many charitable guilds in the country—for the purpose of assisting the crews of boats which get into difficulties. Boats are frequently wrecked in their passage, and the Red Lifeboat has saved the lives of many foreigners in the accidents attendant upon their passage of the Rapids.